YMMV / The Night Gardener

• Complete Monster: Mister Stubbs and Mister Fig are two of the cruelest loan sharks in England. The pair take great enjoyment in psychologically tormenting their debtors, such as the one wealthy but now poor Windsor family, by threatening their loved ones, raising their interest rates to levels that they know cannot be realistically paid back, and demanding their payment at times when their victims aren't expecting or prepared for them. They are fully prepared to follow through with their murderous threats as well, as seen at the climax when they attempt to slaughter the entire Windsor family—including the children, and would have succeeded had a desperate ploy by the heroine Molly not tricked them into arousing the wrath of the titular vengeful ghost.
• Heartwarming Moments:
  • Alastair making up for being a bully all book long and agreeing to help Kip.
  • Master Windsor cradling his ill wife as he takes her from the house and calling her "my love."
• Tear Jerker: Molly's confession of what really happened to her and Kip's parents — they got out of the belowdecks area where they'd been confined to discover that the crew had abandoned ship, fearing the vicious storm the boat was caught in. Their father fought the other passengers to get his two children in the lifeboat. Molly's mother handed her the feverish Kip and told her to take care of him, and they let them down into the water, despite Molly screaming at them not to. The confession is also the point where she has to come to terms with the fact that the letters they've been receiving are forgeries by the tree and their parents are almost certainly dead.

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